New beginnings from fresh endings
by ellonen
Summary: What is life after the battle, to Algren and Taka? It is taking small steps on the path of happiness, to happiness.
1. Chapter 1

i.

When Algren returned to the village, travel-worn, battle-weary and alone, Taka looked at him with a wordless smile, a trace of relief visible in the arch of her eyebrows, the curve of her upper lip. Like water dripping over cold stones in a stream peace flooded over him, taking away the guilt he had born for such a very long time – she did not blame him for what had happened.

In silence, she took up her basket and opened the small, wooden gate for him.

That night, he lay down on the _futon_ spread on the floor and let Taka pour _sake_ on his wounds, the stinging pain on his side and the ache inside him reminding him freshly of the death on the battlefield. Opening his eyes, he looked at Taka's hands, so delicately tying up the wounds he had taken on the behalf of the village he had come to love more than his home.

Wordlessly, with needle and thread she sewed his hurts, her fingers staining in his blood. Afterwards, she closed the door behind her and left him to sleep without nightmares.

ii.

On the morrow – after how many days of slumber, he knew not – Algren walked, stiffly and limping, down the path to the temple where he had _conversed_ with Katsumoto, first against his will; then because he understood. The scent of cherry blossoms lingered in the air and his quiet footsteps reminded him of the _samurai_ and how he had experienced peace in its utmost sense in the place.

Algren looked at the serene statue of Buddha and knew that Katsumoto had found his solace. His peace might be in death as well as in life, but Algren's lay elsewhere; not in the mental teachings and meditation, but here – in this village, under the cherry trees, with the people.

In Taka's touch when she changed the white linens that covered his wounds, brushing her fingers against his skin, making Algren shudder at the ethereality of her presence.

iii.

With the approaching summer came a flourish and beauty of nature Algren had never seen before. Autumn in the village had been breathtaking, all world inhaling its last breath before the winter that was spent in quiet foreboding surety, the flowers and trees giving way to the impending fate.

The fate Katsumoto had changed, leaving only one man to witness the burden of it.

No longer did the _samurai_ go through their daily exercises of endless _kata_ and dance of swords. No longer did Ujio, the fearless warrior, speak orders to the men, mending Algren's pride into honor, bending his desire into determination. No longer did the men laugh with each other after training, nor did they go home to their awaiting wives and children.

Algren walked the empty grounds surrounded by trees and endless fields of grass and remembered. The peace created by the sacrifice of so many lives weighed heavy on the shoulders of the man who had finally given up trying to die and had sworn to stay alive to keep that peace no matter the cost.


	2. Chapter 2

iv.

Once, at the dinner table, Taka's hand brushed against Algren's – accidentally and and fleetingly, but the touch was enough to remind him of what they had shared before the day of his certain death. Algren took his hand back to his teacup and said nothing of it.

Taka gave her children a brief smile, and quietly, looking at the table, offered Algren another bowl of rice.

v.

Algren had never thought of mothers as figures of honor and respect. Having never remembered his own, he hardly had much to say when other soldiers on the field reminisced of their parents, speaking of their warmth and laughter, making jokes of the features they had inherited and the trust they misused. Every mother, it seemed, was a victim of warmhearted jests for their love and blind belief.

With Taka, it was different.

At first Algren had wondered at how she never held her children close or told them stories of mighty emperors. Then he understood that her role was different – it should have been a man's duty to raise the child, and a woman's to keep him safe, but Taka had to fill the man's responsibility as well, alighting a sense of honor in her small boys. There was no hesitation in her when she taught them to read and write, or when she watched them play with the wooden _bokken_ they had received from their father.

And when she tucked them into bed at night – if she lingered a little bit longer next to their _futon_ than was necessary, and if she reached, gingerly, to sweep back a lock of hair from Higen's forehead, but withdrew her hand in silence – who was he to judge, when her eyes held all the love, and more, a mother could ever possess?

Algren walked past the children's room quietly and felt, for the first time in months, like an outsider. A disturber, always; but an outsider, not after what he had done – what they had given him.

But when Magojiro called him "father" and faltered at the words that had so thoughtlessly – easily – left his lips, Algren knelt in front of him, taking his face between his hands and said, "I am not, but thank you."

vi.

Come summer, Algren's wounds were nearly gone.

Running his thumb over the ugly scar on his shoulder he felt the carefully sewed stitches and under, the hardened skin.

Despite how he was more scarred than ever before in his life, on the inside, there was a wholeness so enthralling he felt it seep into his entire being, filling him with its healing power.

Summer had never smelled more beautiful.


	3. Chapter 3

vii.

Algren had seen Taka, once, taking a bath in the cold pond near the forest that surrounded the village. An exposed white shoulder, nothing more; but Algren could not forget the fragility of her frame. Not when all she wanted to show others was the steel in her, the determination and pride behind the soft features and dark eyes.

There was a vigor in her that surpassed that of the _samurai_.

So when Algren looked at their hands, resting on the table after a dinner eaten, he could not help but notice the eerie pallor of her skin, the blue veins flowing beneath, the frailness of her fingers. So delicate – but yet so strong; there was a difference between holding together a family and keeping away an enemy with one's hands.

Taka pushed back the sleeve of her dark kimono and poured him more tea, a silence filling the room, so familiar now after the passing of Nobutada.

viii.

Their first kiss had been the epitome of hesitation, filled with the knowledge of advancing death and suffering, with a trace of hope and promise and – a tremor ran over Algren – something else; the tears shed afterwards causing him to promise, "Never again." A mutual understanding of sorrow and slight possibility, a shared bond built through the one person she had loved and he had killed.

Their second kiss was as hesitant as the first one, but held somewhat else besides – the surety of the coming of an autumn spent together, not due to circumstances, but because of love. Taka's tears, this time, were not grieving, but shed for him – his sorrow. "Never again," he whispered against her hair and held her, afraid of breaking her.

Never again would he ride to war.

Never again would the man she loved be killed.

ix.

To him, she was everything the world could offer.

Algren looked at her, memorizing the path her hands took when she performed her chores, remembering each little detail of her routine; the arch of her slender neck, the fleck of her wrist when she pushed her hair back behind her ear, her quiet steps on the wooden floor when she crept to bid goodnight to her children. To him, she was beauty and peace and life encompassed into one.

When Taka smiled at him, Algren felt his heart tighten with exhilarating freedom.

And when the night came, he stared at the ceiling and felt a craving so burning it nearly ripped his heart asunder, and yet he tried not to relieve it. There was a boundary which he could not cross – living in her home, eating with her – even talking to her – were all nearing that border, but no further would he go.

Enough lives had been stained by him. She would not be another one.


	4. Chapter 4

x.

So engrossed he was with his determination to keep her free of his touch that when she, once, pressed her lips against his and brought her hand hesitantly to the opening of his _gi_, brushing three fingertips against his chest, he inhaled sharply and jerked away. He fumbled backwards; a grown man frightened of a small woman – of what he could do to her.

Taka stammered, even her faltering voice maintaining a sense of dignity Algren envied, blushed, and turned away. "I'm sorry," she whispered, uncertainty seeping into her words. "I'll go now." She swallowed and turned to leave, mortification writ clearly upon her brow. A wall rose behind her eyes, exposing the steel inside her, pushing Algren away.

Realizing what he had done Algren recovered from his shock and grabbed her sleeve. "No, I'm sorry," he said quietly, apologetically. "I'm afraid of..." he stumbled for the right words, "I don't want to hurt you." Hoping, praying, in silence, that Taka would understand, he looked at her with pleading eyes. Please. Don't leave me. Stay with me.

Free me.

She looked up then, to his eyes, and there was compassion in hers. Algren pulled her closer, hesitantly, until she was pressed against his chest, his arms surrounding her, her arms fisted in the back of his _gi_. Whispering words in English to her ear, he stroked her back with relieved, uncertain strokes: "Thank you. Thank you."

xi.

The autumn was fast approaching.

Algren remembered his first autumn in the village; a captive/guest, held against his will but never ill-treated. He remembered the strange people, their politeness, their averted eyes and the laughter of the children. A bitter smile crossed his lips when he thought that he, the man they all had despised, should be the last reminder of the glory of the village.

But now, there was no hatred in the eyes of the villagers. There was respect, and gratefulness, and that, to Algren, made the place feel more familiar than any he had habited before.

And when he returned from his stroll in the woods, he closed his eyes and marveled at the beauty of the words: "Welcome home."


End file.
